Organiser: Human Race
Cost: £70 non btf
Date: sunday 04 july 2010
Course profile: 1500 lake swim, 40.8km bike, 10k run
Age groups: the full works
Number of competitors: 800 odd
Distance: Olympic
Marshalling: signs and a few marshalls (mostly around transition)
Technical: drink station on the run offering water
Facilities: big tent things, portaloos and the lake cafe
Freebies: cotton t-shirt
Cost: £70 non btf
Date: sunday 04 july 2010
Course profile: 1500 lake swim, 40.8km bike, 10k run
Age groups: the full works
Number of competitors: 800 odd
Distance: Olympic
Marshalling: signs and a few marshalls (mostly around transition)
Technical: drink station on the run offering water
Facilities: big tent things, portaloos and the lake cafe
Freebies: cotton t-shirt
Pre Race
This was my last race before IMCH so I should have felt good going into it...wrong! On Monday I did my last LSD run (3:30 v boring on your own) and all felt well but about four hours later I realised I had pulled one of the muscles on the outside of my foot (p brevis if you are interested :ugeek: ) lots of RICE ensued (well some)....and then to cap it all on the Friday I did a long swim set and aggravated a trapezius injury I developed earlier in training - I spent most of Saturday in a lot of pain but luckily this had mostly gone by Sunday am...
Sunday started fairly early with a 0645 breakfast before jumping in the loaded car - OMG I was organised this time...I don't think I forgot anything :o :shock: - and heading to Dorney Lake. Luckily I arrived early enough I managed to park right next to the crossing point on the bike course so I had a quick exit at the end...it was still a good 500-600m walk to transition tho...
I bimbled up to transition with bike and box (dropping the bike once and chipping the laquer finish on my carbon handlebars :x ) registered and racked my bike - simples.no sweat and for once transition seemed absolutely fine :D
Swim
After the customary wave to camera and (rather short) race briefing I headed to the front right for the swim - pole position :o I love swimming and thankfully it is one thing I am quite good at (as those who know me will know that is where it stops in the world of tri!) - the hooter went and off the washing machine went...it is the first time I have felt confident enough to go at the front and it almost worked except I forgot I have been training for IM not Oly - so I have lost a lot of speed - oh well - I just missed the front pack on the sprint start so I pulled back on the gas and cruised the rest - seeing almost no other swimmers in the process - it was a bit lonely!! One word of advice - if you do a tri at Dorney - follow the ropes that hold the rowing buoys they are like pool lane markers and they take you to the turn buoys - it took me one lap to work that out - DOH! Anyway swim went well - exiting the water in 25:53 a couple of mins behind the lead pack - I made the distance with my Garmin 310(with the swim upgrade) 1.7km so a little long...
T1
All went well for once - a little slow as always (as I put on socks/gloves) but not bad - 2:47
Bike
:D :D :D :D :D :D
It went well - it was ****ing windy on the first corner behind tent city and then all the way to the other end of the rowing tank but wayhay on the return leg it was FAST - maxing out at over 45kph and averaging 30.4kph. I have to say this was the first time on a bike leg I felt good and raced hard - over the past few weeks my LSD bikes have turned into long pace sessions (1hr at easy, 3hr at IM, 1.5hr at MD and .5hr at oly pace) and think god they have as my Garmin waved the white flag at this point and did not pick up HR/cadence from here on....it was all on RPE! Felt good, came in at 1:18:50 :D (bike was a little long at 41.01km)
T2
At this point I had a melt down and decided that my prerace plan for nutrition was not enough so I stopped to pull another gel out of the box - grabbed my fuelbelt bottle (shoved in trisuit pocket) and another gel shoes on and off...1:58 - not bad for me!
Run
Okay so I had planned to push the swim and bike, cruise the run and push the last 3km....no plan survices contact so the wheels came off a bit..I had no HRM (as the Garmin was still sulking)...so I started out at what I thought was a calm pace and looked at my watch 5:15/km - I slowed down - inevitable stitch developed so I settled at around 6:15 - 6:30/km - I heard malteser shout which perked me up (thanks mate :D :D ) and I just ran (slowly) round the route with my left ankle not enjoying things. I carried on in this vein until the last 2k where I pushed hard and held the pace at around 5:30-6:00/km - outrunning a few people finishing in 1:02:20 (run was 9.79km)
Overall time = 2:51:50 56/98 in age group and 266/482 finished
In summary a good race, if a little windy and boring on the bike (but good for practising maintaining max effort) - I was a little galled by the freebies (t-shirt only) for my seventy quid entrance fee but at least it was well signed/marshalled and run.
I.
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